Struggling SolarEdge Technologies Will Cut 400 Jobs

SolarEdge Technologies said it would lay off about 400 workers, including 200 in its home country of Israel, as the company tries to become more financially stable.

SolarEdge on July 15 announced the job cuts in a letter to employees. The company, which said it had about 4,600 workers prior to the layoffs, had announced 900 job cuts in January of this year.

“The downturn of the market at the end of 2023 and beginning of 2024 had led to an accumulation of excess inventory in our distribution channels,” Chief Executive Zvi Lando said in the letter. “We know that as inventory channels clear, our sales volumes are lower than the rate of installations and that this clearing process will take time.”

The renewable energy group said it also would reduce discretionary spending. The company’s stock price is off more than 60% this year, and reported a net loss of $157 million in the first quarter, its third consecutive quarterly loss.

SolarEdge recently opened its first two U.S. manufacturing plants. The first facility, in Austin, Texas, opened late last year. The factory makes the company’s residential Home Hub Inverters.

A second facility in Seminole, Florida, opened earlier this year. SolarEdge on July 11 said it had recently shipped the first 20,000 Power Optimizers from that plant. The factory has plans to begin commercial inverter production next year.

Both facilities were built in response to “domestic content” incentives offered by the Inflation Reduction Act that was passed in 2022.

—Darrell Proctor is a senior associate editor for POWER (@POWERmagazine).